Lost in all of this mess is the forgotten issue of the recruiting dinners at the Papadakis Taverna. This was one of the first blips on the screen that the compliance office wasn't doing its job. There was good reason as to why the school stopped going to the Greek Restaurant in San Pedro.
For years we have been listening to that blow hard Petros Papdakis bash Reggie Bush. I am not necessarily sure what Petros' deal is WRT Bush but he has had a bug up his rear end about Bush for quite some time.
Certainly we are in this mess mostly because of Reggie, but part of the LOIC charge was because of the recruiting dinners at the Papadakis Taverna. Once again the compliance office failed to properly monitor these dinners.
No one will question the loyalty that the Papdakis family has towards USC but Petros now needs to shut up. He has been taking shots at Reggie for years with little or no accountability...that ended on Black Thursday. He has just forfeited his right to call out any USC player who breaks the rules going forward because of his families involvement in the sanctions against USC.
From the NCAA report...( end of page #37 through the middle of page # 38)
IMPERMISSIBLE RECRUITING CONTACTS BY A BOOSTER. [NCAA Bylaws 13.01.2, 13.01.4 and 13.6.7.1]
On several occasions beginning in December 2002 and continuing to December 2005, during prospective football student-athletes' official paid visits to the institution's campus, a representative of the institution's athletics interests and the owner of a local restaurant ("representative A") made impermissible off-campus recruiting contacts with a number of prospective student-athletes.
Committee Rationale
The enforcement staff and institution are in agreement with the facts of this finding and that violations of NCAA legislation occurred. The institution believed that conversations between representative A and prospective student-athletes visiting his restaurant were neither made nor intended to be of a recruiting nature. The institution further asserted that these conversations were not interpreted by the prospects as having a recruiting purpose, and that they did not play a role in any prospect's decisions to attend the institution. The enforcement staff took no formal position as to whether the contacts were major or secondary violations. Although the committee finds that the violations were secondary, they form a component of Finding B-7, lack of institutional control.
As we all know, the dinners at the Taverna were a staple of USC's recruiting in the early part of the Pete Carroll era.
It does not surprise me that the discontinuation of these dinners was because of what the compliance office finally saw in the possible issues that could and did come up in the NCAA's ruling. This isn't some dinner at Morton's Steak House...this is a dinner where the owner is a former player of the program. His tavern is a clear home court advantage for the program. I don't have a problem with dinners but there needs to be the same level of scrutiny applied to those dinners like the NCAA is trying to apply WRT high profile athletes then it be applied here.
Better safe than sorry.
Petros can bash Reggie all he wants but he looks like a fool doing it because his family name just took a hit as well...maybe not as big as Reggie's did but Petros' family name is in the report and his dad (and maybe even Petros for all we know) is specifically linked to running afoul of the NCAA's rules so they're on the hook as much as Reggie is. So it is hypocritical for him to continue to bash Reggie Bush.
Here is Petros on the sanctions. I love it how he once again hammers Reggie but there is no discussion of his dad's restaurant involvement in the breaking of rules.
In for a dime in for a dollar I always say.